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Tag type: Character

Tag refers to images featuring or referencing the iconic African American musician.

He was born on August 29, 1958 and died on June 25, 2009. He was born to a musical family. He began professionally singing when he was a child, joining his brothers to form the group Jackson 5 and became the most well known member of the group and, eventually, of the Jackson family in general. After the group disbanded, Michael continued to perform as a solo artist and became even more popular and influential, particularly after the release of the 1982 album Thriller. Jackson's dance moves and musical stylings influenced many other musicians since. Some well known dance moves popularized by him include the moon walk and the gravity defying lean he performs in Smooth Criminal. He also became well known for his lengthy and elaborate music videos which were almost like short films complete with a story arc and a conflict alongside a performance of the song. Jackson even collaborated with well known Hollywood filmmakers and actors to make these videos. The costumes he wore in his videos became just as iconic as the videos and songs themselves. Jackson is famous for his high-pitched breathy and youthful sounding singing voice and often used a similar tone when speaking. While Jackson was famous and recognizable for said falsetto voice, his actual voice, and one he used rarely when performing in public was considerably lower. It is also common for Michael Jackson parodies to imitate his distinctive way of shouting "Come on!" which ends up sounding more like "Cha'mone!" or "Shamone!" Unlike most musicians, Jackson did not write his music down on paper. Instead, he would use a sound recorder and recite the lyrics from memory. He would even use his own voice to imitate the sound of other instruments instead of playing them himself.

Unfortunately for Jackson, his personal problems came to overshadow his musical career during his later years. He was known for being very close friends with children to the point that he would invite them for sleepovers. In 1993, he was accused by Evan Chandler of sexually abusing his 13 year old son Jordan Chandler. While the lawsuit was ultimately settled out of court, the case significantly damaged Jackson's reputation turning him into a controversial figure. The question of whether or not he actually molested any of his child friends also became a notoriously controversial subject. He was much less prolific during the late 1990s-2000s than he was earlier in his career. Jackson planned a grand final tour for his career called This is It in 2009, but he passed away before he could perform on stage. While the tour never happened, it spawned a documentary showing Jackson's preparation for the planned concert and Jackson's sudden death inspired many tributes to Jackson.

Jackson was also known for being a musician whose physical appearance radically changed over the course of his career. In his early career, he was a dark-skinned and dark-haired African man, but he suffered from the skin disease vitiligo, which causes depigmentation of the skin. This disease, combined with his multiple plastic surgeries, made his skin become increasingly pale.

The character Django from One Piece is based off of Jackson's appearance in his later years and even moonwalks like Jackson. Jackson was also known to have a strong interest in video games and he had a sizable arcade collection within his home. He has a game based off of him called Moonwalker and has a cameo in Space Channel 5. Jackson is also said to have worked on the soundtrack to Sonic 3 and Knuckles, but how much of his work made it into the game remains unclear and he isn't credited.